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This chapter is dedicated to you x

"Rememberthe party at mine on Friday!" Marcus shouted from the bench in the changing room. I shut my locker and fist pumped him before leaving.

"You're going?" Theo asked, his top in his hand. He shut his locker and shrugged on his top.

"Yeah. My sister wants to talk to me about something." I shrugged and took out my phone, 5:12. "Hey, I'll er, see you around." I said and patted his shoulder.

"Yeah, see you." I could feel him watching me as I went and I often saw him do that. Though not to me. It was someone else though I could never find out who. He'd always look away by the time I caught him.

My phone buzzed and I looked at it.

I'm outside :)

I smiled and bit my lip, pushing open the doors to the school. Before I walked over to his car, that was parked and waiting for me, I combed back my hair and licked my tongue over my lips. I needed to use some Vaseline.

One person that had that was in fact, my sister. Though I didn't think she would be too pleased on me using her stuff. She almost killed me for it last time.

I rushed over to the car and slipped into the passenger seat and smiled as soon as I saw how pleased he looked. I noticed how he wore those cute black glasses that I liked so much. He knew I liked them. It was almost like he was testing me. Testing my patience.

"How was practise?" He asked, fixing a strand of my blonde hair. I cleared my throat and pulled the seatbelt over me, clicking it in.

"It was good. Think we are a lot closer to winning the big game." I said, trying not to let his watchful gaze effect me. But I'd lie if I said it didn't.

Jackson leant in close, his breath fanning my cheek. I gulped. "I think it's cute that you were tying to make yourself look good before coming to see me." His words struck me like lightning. Holy shit. He saw that?

"You saw that?" I asked, embarrassed, and watched him shamelessly nod. He started up the car with a chuckle and I turned to look out the window, completely flustered. No matter if I was some tough and big-bodied football player, his words and actions always made me fall apart and shrivel up into a ball. He had that effect on me, and I loved it.

Jackson was a simple guy. Liked simple things. But I seemed to be the most complicated thing in his life. Numerous times he said that I was what made his life exciting. I just thought that I was chaos.

I was glad I had him.

He was glad to have me.

I just wanted to stay like this forever. I didn't want anyone to know about us, yet. Was there even an 'us'? I wasn't imagining it when I said it was different from any kind of bro relationship I had with the guys.

I was afraid he'd make a run for it, leave me. Then find someone knew.

But he didn't seem like he would.

"Want to come back to mine? My parents are away for the rest of the week." Jackson asked, glancing at me as he tried to steady the car.

I chuckled. "Keep your eyes on the road, tough guy."

That made him laugh. I made him laugh. "Then stop being so distracting." He said then suddenly swerved. I didn't know if he meant to do that or that the car actually went out of control. Jackson was full of surprise.

"Seriously, do you want to die?" I asked, laughing mid sentence. He laughed and ruffled my hair before looking back towards the road.

I tried suppress the laughter that I could feel bubbling up in my stomach. But I couldn't help it. It came out.

He looked over at me for a couple seconds. Then he looked away. "What?" He asked.

"Nothing." I said, shaking my head. He just stared at me again before looking away. "So you're home alone all week, huh?"

He rested his arm on the console and nodded, "Yep. What am I going to do with myself?" He asked, clearly trying to draw me into the idea of coming to his. "I might just lie in bed all by myself. Thinking about absolutely nothing." He gave me the puppy dog eyes and I sighed.

"Not tonight, my sister wants to talk with me." I said. I had a rough idea what she wanted to talk to me about. Back when me and Willow were, not so close, Jackson told me I should be softer on her. That I should be kinder because she was kind to me. But I just found it difficult to talk to her. Especially when I found out about Dad and his girlfriend. It just made me feel sick. I knew how much my sister looked up to Dad, even though she probably wouldn't admit that.

I must've looked sad because as soon as Jackson stopped at a red light, he turned my face towards him. "Hey. What's the matter?"

"Nothing. Everything's fine." I said, clearing my throat. But he still looked at me. Almost liked he didn't believe my words. "Cal, speak to me." He whispered.

"Not right now," I told him and he nodded his head slowly. "But soon. I promise."

"No need to rush. You can go as slow as you want with me." He said and it made me feel lighter. "You're a strong guy, you can do this." He joked, giving me a teasing smile.

I sniggered and rolled my eyes.

"What? Can't I compliment you? Is it because you know I'm right?" He asked.

"You're sweet when you want to be," I started. "But. There's got to be a but coming." He said. "But, you can also be extremely cheesy." I finished and he held his heart, like he had just been stabbed.

"But you like it." He stated and I turned my head to look out of the window.

"Yeah, whatever. You think what you want."

"I'll think that."

🝮🝮🝮

"I'm home!" I shouted, dumping my bag down onto the floor. I kicked off my shoes and walked down the hallway, checking all the rooms. The whole house was quiet.

Then there was a bang coming from upstairs. Then a scream.

"Did you die?" I shouted.

"I did!" Willow shouted back before running down the stairs. She was cloaked in a jumper. A familiar jumper. A jumper that wasn't actually mine.

"Did you take that from my room?" I asked, pulling her back by the sweater. She turned around and looked down at it, scared.

"I don't remember seeing it in there." She shrugged, slowly walking into the kitchen. I followed behind her and took out my phone, sending Jackson a quick message that I'd be happy to go to his sometime this week. He didn't reply straight away of course, he was driving himself home.

"It's not mine, but whatever. What did you want to talk to me about? I have some- uh, some studying to do." I tried not to slip up, but of course I did. Willow turned around, taking a bite into a rosy red apple.

"You study?" She asked, raising her neat brows at me and I rolled my eyes and took a seat at the counter. "Okay. So what I wanted to talk to you about was- hey do you want a drink? You can have my strawberry mil-"

"Just tell me." I warned and she sighed. I didn't know how to describe how she looked. She clenched her fists and directed her gaze elsewhere. Anywhere but my eyes. "What's happened? I know I haven't been the best brot-"

"It's Dad." She blurted out before slapping her hands over her mouth. Then she took a deep breath. "It's about Dad. T-that's what I wanted to talk to you about."

The room fell into silence and I clenched my fists together, leaning them against my forehead as I looked down at the counter. What had "Dad" done now? Who else was he screwing? Was it Mom's best friend, June? Five months pregnant but knowing him, he could worm himself in there somehow.

I couldn't believe it. So much, that I had to stand up and pace around the kitchen. Willow didn't once try to tell me what he had done, probably aware I might flip. I was severely close to losing my shit.

I sat back down again and this time, Willow was beside me, though seated afar. "Do you want to talk?" She asked quietly and I took in a breath. She stayed quiet and I started to feel bad. "What are you d-" I cut her short by pulling her into a hug. I was surprised by my abruptness, so was she. But I still kept my arms around her. I hadn't hugged her in so long. It felt kind of, nice. But I knew I'd cringe thinking back to this tomorrow.

"Oh." Willow said softly as she started to relax her arms around me. "This is unusual. Maybe I should post this on Facebook-"

"Don't ruin the moment. A hug is a hug, take it or leave it." I grumbled and she stayed quiet. I knew she appreciated it because I could feel her arms tighten around me. "Want to get ice cream and talk this out? I feel like we should relieve the tension a bit." I offered and she laughed, quickly swiping her finger under her eye, catching a fallen tear.

"Sounds good."

We soon set off and made our way to the ice cream parlour. Usually I'd not choose going to the ice cream parlour to "talk" but it was a place me and Willow would always go when Mom and Dad were fighting. They rarely figured and if they ever did, it was something serious. Mom was an amazing person and Dad, well he had quite the temper. A temper wasn't a good thing all of the time. It made you feel heard, but for all the wrong reasons. With him, anyway.

I grabbed my pot of ice cream and took a seat. We both sat in silence and I took this time to eat. Though Willow just stared down at her ice cream, ogling it like it was there to scare her. I nudged her side causing her to look up. "Aren't you going to eat? What was the point of coming here if you're not going to eat your ice cream."

Willow shrugged. "Can we talk now? I'll feel better once we've spoken." She mumbled and I tossed my pot down onto the table. "We're talking now, right?" She asked and I rolled my eyes. "Okay," She breathed and I knew it was going to be intense. "So, after that photo you took, o-of Dad and Miss Walker, well, I kind of went there." As soon as she saw my panicked and shocked face, she sat up straight and widened her eyes. "Hear me out, hear me out! I didn't speak to him. I don't think he even knew I was there."

"You think? Or you know?" I asked, raising my

voice.

She sighed. "I think. I didn't see him see me. I was in my car and was parked quite far away. Can I continue?"

I nodded my head and raked my hands through my hair. For fuck sake.

"Okay, so I was sat in my car, this was before school so I wanted something to happen, and fast. Anyway, after waiting for a while and about to go, the door swung open. It was Dad and Miss Walker! Both there, in broad daylight!"

"No way." I said with much enthusiasm to which she just glared at me. "We know he lives with her so what is it that you actually wanted to tell me?"

She took in a deep inhale and cleared her throat. I could see her bash her eyelashes more and more and I almost nudged her again to carry on, but she did it herself. "Dad came out wearing his work uniform and Miss Walker came more in view. I was obviously upset and wanted to go and say something, but I refrained myself from doing so because I knew how badly that could've gone. As Dad was, you know, kissing her goodbye, I noticed something. Something I wished I hadn't seen."

"Them having sex on the doorstep?"

"What? No! Ew! Why would you even think that? Oh for Pete's sake now I'm imagining it! I'm imagining my own dad doing the dirty. The devil's tango!" She whacked her head and I groaned. "Okay sorry. Sidetracked and stuff. "Do I just say it right away or gradually build up to it?"

"You already have gradually built up to it. Just say it already."

"She's pregnant. Our old middle school teacher is pregnant. She's got a baby pump and looks like she was about to pop. I'm really trying to be positive about this else I'm going to cry and everyone's going to think I'm having a mental breakdown which I basically am." She breathed breathlessly and I almost choked on my own saliva. Almost jumped into the oncoming traffic. Nearly whacked my head against the wall. "She's what?" I asked, standing up and pushing my chair back.

Willow shuffled in her seat uncomfortably. "She is, urm. She's pregnant."

I groaned into my hands and noticed the few people in here were looking at us, absolutely confused. I could feel the anger build up in my stomach and I tried my best to swallow it down. I didn't want to be like him.

"I can't believe this." I said and grabbed the pot of ice cream, throwing it straight into the bin. I pushed open the door and walked down the road. I didn't know where I was going. I just wanted to clear my head, I guess.

"Where are you going Cal?" Willow shouted from behind me. I turned around, shoving my hands into my sweater pockets. "Somewhere. I'll be fine, just go home."

"What? No! I'm not leaving you when you're like this! You can be reckless." I rolled my eyes at her stubbornness. But she was right. I was reckless. God forbid what she would do if she found out the stuff I did when I wasn't home. She still thought I played with car toys and shit.

I stayed rooted to the spot and allowed her to walk over. "You know I'm in the same boat as you in all of this, right?" I scoffed at her words and turned around to face away from her. "Look at me Callum! Why are you hiding from me? Why are you hiding from thi-"

"Are you kidding me?" I shouted and she stepped back. "You're such a suck up to him. You love Dad and couldn't believe me when I said he was cheating on Mom. You only want to believe what you want to believe. Hear what you want to hear. Why didn't you believe me from the beginning, huh?" I didn't notice the tears falling from my eyes.

"I'm sorry." Willow said quietly and looked down at the floor. "I didn't want to believe you because then it would become true. We really wouldn't be a family anymore. I guess that is something I'll have to live with. But please, let's not fight. I don't want to lose you now too."

I wiped my eyes aggressively and pushed her into my chest.

I allowed her to cry until crying wasn't an option anymore.

"I'm the biggest jerk possible." I said, gulping.

"No you're not. I'm the biggest jerk possible for not believing you sooner. We wouldn't be standing here, hugging like we've just been through a marriage divorce if I believed you sooner."

I laughed and stepped back. She did the same.

"Truce?" I asked, sticking my pinky finger out to which she wrapped hers around. "Truce."

"Now that's over. We don't speak a word about this. No one knows about this besides you and I." I warned with the point of my finger.

"Sounds good to me. O-oh! If you get anymore information or news about, you know who, tell me straight away. Okay?" She asked, wiping her eyes.

"Okay." I said. "But you too."

She nodded and smiled. "Let's never fight again."

"Never say never. You know us, we can't last a day without fighting." I told her and she laughed.

"Whatever. Now let's get home, I want to watch some more of Gilmore Girls." She said and turned around, heading back to the car. I caught up and walked beside her. "Want to watch it with me? Popcorn and vodka is involved."

"Vodka? Have you been through the secret stash?" I asked, grabbing my heart. But she just stared up at me, neutral-faced.

"Want to watch it or not?"

"Fine. I could use some alcohol tonight."

"Weirdo." She glared.

"Airhead

"Dick twister."

"Dick twister?."

"Yeah. You twist dicks for a living."

I scowled, feeling utterly grossed out. "That is definitely not pleasurable. At all, actually."

"Yeah well." She shrugged. "I heard it's good to do when someone you dislike is being an asshole."

"Aimed at who?"

"Your friends." She said and got inside the car.

"Touché, touché."

A/N:

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